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Monday, July 30, 2012

The World Remains the Same

I am going to take a minute to get up on my soap box. I promise my next post will be all happiness and light, but this comes from a place of being tired of hearing that our world sucks. And so much worse than "the good old days." And I just don't believe that. If you want to know why...read on. Otherwise I will see you later in the week for some amazeballs pics from the festival I went to this weekend where my stare-itis almost made my head blow off...

With the recent happenings in Colorado, I worry for my children, my family, my friends. I worry that we are not safe anywhere. Everywhere has a potential mad man waiting with a gun and a scheme. I tell myself, "T, this is why you don't watch the news. It is too painful, too sad, too disturbing, too frustrating." At this point in my life, with a young child, everything I see touches the exposed nerve of motherhood. I cry too easily to watch the grieving families holding each other and the friends gathered with candles. I despair that my children may never be truly safe in this world. Breathe, calm down, take a minute. I remind myself the world has always been this way, and it will always be this way.

I believe that there is not more violence in our world, there is more access to information. The same amount of bloodshed has aways existed. Some times may have had a little more, other times a little less. I imagine the Inquisition was a scary time. Since the dawn of time, there have been crazy people. People who only want to strike others down. People filled with rage and hurt and darkness. Our history as a human race is filled with wars, killings, and torture. The lone gunmen, the gangsters, the posses, they have always existed. They have always wreaked havoc on our feelings of safety and security. Every person at every point in time has understood that there are bad people in this world who only care about doing harm. The difference in today and ancient Egypt, or the great west filled with cowboys, or the 13th century London, or the New York of the roaring 20's, is information. We live in a time when information is king. A person gets their purse stolen in Dubai and it is possible for a mother in Minnesota to know about it. Within minutes. Information can travel lightening fast and there is no stopping it. This is why we feel that we are surround by terrible things happening. Because we are, in a virtual sense. We are steeping ourselves in the negative of the world. I refuse to believe that the human race is getting worse. I can not be convinced that every day that passes means we are closer to losing our humanity and sympathy and empathy. Nothing that the news or the internet or my neighbor tells me will crush my faith that people are inherently good. We are not worse, we are informed.

My wish is not to dimish the tragedy in Colorado. Every person living that nightmare is justified. This is most likely the single worse thing that will ever happen in their life. The diffence between what happens today versus 100 years ago, is that we are all living through it together constantly. The positive side of us all being connected, is that we form a world support system. Today it takes mere seconds for the world to come together in shared disbelief and outrage and love and concern. It is a different world superimposed over the same world that has always existed. The same things are happening for good and bad, but we are living with the ability to stay informed constantly. With these advancements we are allowed to be part of each other's lives in all aspects.

I cannot believe that every day the world becomes a more terrible place. If I believed that, I wouldn't have been able to have a child, or leave the house, or even smile. I will use the heinous things that happen in the world to explain to my child why we need to be positive and honest and loving. Good and evil will both always exist. History has taught us that over and over. Because there will always be a bad in the world, we must be the good.